{"id":11992,"date":"2017-08-15T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2017-08-15T09:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vo.afonico-test.ru\/novosti-otrasli\/russia-charts-40-years-of-icebreaker-progress\/"},"modified":"2026-03-24T14:03:29","modified_gmt":"2026-03-24T11:03:29","slug":"russia-charts-40-years-of-icebreaker-progress","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vosafety.ru\/en\/novosti-otrasli\/russia-charts-40-years-of-icebreaker-progress\/","title":{"rendered":"Russia charts 40 years of icebreaker progress"},"content":{"rendered":"

Russia is this week celebrating the historic achievements of its nuclear-powered icebreaker fleet and has also announced project milestones for its latest vessels. The Arktika<\/em> was the first surface vessel to reach the North Pole, on 17\u00a0August 1977. The seventh and largest Arktika<\/em> class icebreaker\u00a0\u2014 50\u00a0Years of Victory<\/em>\u00a0\u2014 entered service in 2007\u00a0and is now on its way to the North Pole to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the Arktika\u2019s <\/em>expedition.<\/strong><\/h4>\n

50\u00a0Years of Victory<\/em>\u00a0\u2014 which is 25,800\u00a0dwt, 160\u00a0m long and 20\u00a0m wide, and is designed to break through ice up to 2.8\u00a0m thick\u00a0\u2014 left the port of Murmansk on 13\u00a0August. It aims to reach the North Pole on 17\u00a0August when the Russian Federation flag will be hoisted in memory of the Arktika\u2019<\/em>s pioneering captain, Yury Kuchiyev, and his crew.<\/p>\n

During the expedition, the icebreaker will host a conference dedicated to the future of the Arktika<\/em> fleet, environmental protection of the Arctic region and the development of year-round navigation along the Northern Sea Route. Members of the original crew, parliamentarians, veterans of Atomflot and representatives of the state nuclear corporation Rosatom will attend the conference.<\/p>\n

Atomflot Director-General Vyacheslav Ruksha said yesterday the voyage has two meanings. \u201cWe are paying tribute to the Arktika<\/em>\u2019s legendary campaign and expressing our gratitude to our veterans. We are also demonstrating that, today, after 40\u00a0years of successful work in the western sector of the Arctic, modern Russia is ready to perform such global tasks as ensuring year-round navigation along the Northern Sea Route. The construction of new universal nuclear icebreakers will serve this purpose\u201d.<\/p>\n

50\u00a0Years of Victory<\/em> is scheduled to return to port on 23\u00a0August.<\/p>\n

Atomflot, a subsidiary of Russian state nuclear corporation Rosatom, said yesterday that Kuchiyev\u2019s achievement was comparable to \u201cthe first human\u2019s journey into outer space\u201d, referring to Yury Gagarin\u2019s orbit of the Earth in the Vostok<\/em> spacecraft on 12\u00a0April 1961.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Arktika<\/em> expedition, which took seven days and eight hours to complete and crossed 2528\u00a0miles, practically proved the possibility of year-round navigation on the shortest routes of the Arctic Ocean, as well as the possibility of transit passage of the Northern Sea Route\u201d, it added.<\/p>\n

Progress<\/h4>\n

Rosatom\u2019s nuclear fuel manufacturer subsidiary TVEL has announced its delivery of a batch of fuel assemblies for a universal nuclear icebreaker of the new generation of Arktika<\/em>. The fuel assemblies, which were produced by TVEL\u2019s Chepetsky Mechanical Plant (ChMZ), consist of \u201cseamless narrow-walled hexagonal pipes of zirconium alloy\u201d with a wall thickness of about 1.6\u00a0mm, TVEL said yesterday.<\/p>\n

They are a \u201cunique and exclusive technology\u201d, which ChMZ have produced for the first time, together with scientists from the AA Bochvar Research Institute of Inorganic Materials (VNIINM), which is another Rosatom subsidiary. The fuel assemblies will be assembled by TVEL\u2019s Mashinostroitelny Zavod (Elemash) plant. The fuel is intended for use in RITM-200\u00a0reactors.<\/p>\n

In January 2013, Rosatom called for bids to build two more of these universal icebreaker vessels (project 22220), for delivery in 2019\u00a0and 2020, and in May 2104\u00a0a contract for RUB84.4\u00a0billion was signed with United Shipbuilding Corporation. In August the same year, Russian regulator Rostechnadzor licensed Baltijsky Zavod Shipbuilding to install the RITM-200\u00a0reactor units from OKBM Afrikantov for the pilot model. The keel of the first, Arktika<\/em>, was laid in November 2013, and that of the second, Sibir<\/em>, in May 2015.<\/p>\n

ZIO-Podolsk, part of Rosatom\u2019s engineering division Atomenergomash, said yesterday it had completed the assembly of the integrated building of the RITM-200\u00a0reactor for Sibir<\/em> with the installation of steam generator \u201ccassettes\u201d. Produced by JSC Afrikantov OKBM, each of the 12\u00a0cassettes weighs almost one-and-a-half tonnes. Now the reactor structure is being prepared for hydraulic testing, ZIO-Podolsk added.<\/p>\n

RITM-200\u00a0reactors have 175\u00a0MWt each and are deigned to deliver 60\u00a0MW at the propellers via twin turbine-generators and three motors.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Russia is this week celebrating the historic achievements of its nuclear-powered icebreaker fleet and has also announced project milestones for its latest vessels. The Arktika was the first surface vessel to reach the North Pole, on 17\u00a0August 1977. The seventh and largest Arktika class icebreaker\u00a0\u2014 50\u00a0Years of Victory\u00a0\u2014 entered service in 2007\u00a0and is now on…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[15],"tags":[],"yst_prominent_words":[],"translation":{"provider":"WPGlobus","version":"2.10.5","language":"en","enabled_languages":["ru","en"],"languages":{"ru":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":false},"en":{"title":false,"content":false,"excerpt":false}}},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vosafety.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11992"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vosafety.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vosafety.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vosafety.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vosafety.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11992"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/vosafety.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11992\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16197,"href":"https:\/\/vosafety.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11992\/revisions\/16197"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vosafety.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11992"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vosafety.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11992"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vosafety.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11992"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vosafety.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=11992"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}